


to love and be loved

by m_k_ch



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Headcanon, Light Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-17
Updated: 2016-09-17
Packaged: 2018-08-15 12:42:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8056840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_k_ch/pseuds/m_k_ch
Summary: there are secrets he hides and he's not really someone everybody thinks he is.there's someone he loves and he wonders how he deserves to ever have him.





	to love and be loved

**Author's Note:**

> written fast, written to elaborate on a headcanon i have about atobe, and written because i haven't done atohiyo in awhile. i miss them.
> 
> i don't exactly like it but take it.

It’s so easy for Atobe to hide how he truly feels.

Years of struggling and he learned how to act as if nothing was wrong at all, even enough to fool his own heart that he was okay and that he was going to get through his hardships with a single snap of his fingers.

In the end, it would all come crashing down until he realizes he couldn’t do anything about it at all.

It was so funny that people thought he was so capable enough with his riches, with his mindset, with the people he has and the so-called “love” he had conquered.

So hilarious, so foolish.

At the sunset of the ending day no one would notice the very little flinches he made or the turmoil in his mind, that he was like every other people who had their own set of crisis. Maybe even worse than theirs.

And Atobe would break in somewhere no one would see him, somewhere where he would easily hide his quiet tears, like in the shower and pretend his sniffles were only because of the perfectly timed weather that acted up the people’s systems.

He didn’t know if he should thank nature that it saved him from embarrassment, or if he should be sad that the nature worked with him to be isolated from everyone else who failed to understand for who he really is.

Of course there are people who, in the beginning, saw him at his breaking point. Just like Kabaji, his very dear childhood friend whom he would spoil because he cares for him too much, but as much as he doesn’t like pointing out his flaws, it just didn’t feel right.

As if Atobe felt some sort of guilt, that he was ever always so unworthy of having someone like Kabaji by his side at all.

Then all those thoughts came crashing down as he felt fingers intertwine with his, hidden under the shades of night mixed with dull orange street lights and open stores. He comes back to Earth and witness Hiyoshi beside him, gaze straight front but hands held tight with his and it was in this silence that Atobe knows what it was like to love and be loved.

There, again, that the guilt crawls on his back as they walk under the dark trees and emptying parks with the beautiful shine of the moon and thinks, I don’t deserve this, the thought he always had behind all the self-praise he made in front of everybody. Why did he ever deserve such a perfect scenario when all he did was pretend his words were all real, all hopeful?

All those lies to make everyone happy, the lies that eat him away with the tainting mixture of guilt and thinks, _this is all very wrong._

“Please, whatever it is you’re thinking, say it.”

Hiyoshi’s voice was enough to pull him out, and Atobe only shook his head and it was no use to deny it with make-believe narcissism because he knows, and he wonders how in the world that people like Hiyoshi could read him, could get close to him, when he was just an idolized kind of figure to everybody else.

And it wasn’t until Hiyoshi pulls him in and embraces him so tightly behind a wall where no one could see them, and Atobe only silently wrapped his arms back. It wasn’t like him to be so silent, to let Hiyoshi be the one to say words for him, but what could he honestly do when Hiyoshi could counter his lies with ease? To go through the words he never meant to say, the actions he never thought he did?

And he thinks, _he understands me_.

But also maybe not, because Hiyoshi’s life is much more different than his and his thoughts are complex in his own way, but Hiyoshi was the one who broke Atobe’s barriers from everything else and there he is, hugging him in the middle of the night.

Atobe feels as if this is his entire world.

His entire world where Hiyoshi looks up from his embrace and presses his lips on Atobe’s, gentle and chaste and so _loving_ for someone who barely understands him anyway, but he’s still there for him despite the locked chains in his heart.

Still there and still trying to crawl his way in to get him to open up from his secrets, but so gentle enough that his efforts are toned down to slightest of touches that makes Atobe feel all the things he wanted are gone and only here, in front of him and kissing him in the dark corners and they don’t even care. Even though it was no where Atobe would ever want to be.

Yet Hiyoshi would turn his thoughts around, make him think entirely different and make him learn things he never thought he already understood, until he hears them from Hiyoshi and knows again that there are far more things he doesn’t understand. He wonders how Hiyoshi does these things, and Atobe throws away all the stupid little thoughts he had for Hiyoshi the first time he met him.

It changed into something more, from mentoring to being teammates, from teammates to being friends, and to friends to being ones who escape into their little world in empty locker rooms and abandoned tennis courts.

So here they are, holding each other and Atobe feels all the struggles crumble away as Hiyoshi pulls away from their kiss and lean his forehead on his, reassuring him of everything wonderful that he always wanted to be true (and they _are true_ ), of all rewards he very much deserved (and he does), and all the things Atobe always wanted to have (and it's to love and be loved).

And Atobe thinks, _I am happy_.

**Author's Note:**

> not really proofread since i was only waiting for llss to air and i had nothing better to do. 
> 
> i was also listening to last continue by pinocchiop. ha! who thought vocaloid songs could still affect me (it has always affected me what am i saying)


End file.
